The Neutron and the Universe - History of a Relationship

TL;DR

This paper reviews the role of neutrons in understanding the Universe's history, covering topics from space-time structure to fundamental particle properties, and discusses recent and future experimental efforts.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of neutron-related research in particle and astrophysics, emphasizing recent developments and experimental challenges.

Findings

Neutron experiments test gravitation at small scales

Search for neutron electric dipole moment related to CP-violation

Neutron lifetime impacts primordial nucleosynthesis models

Abstract

We discuss selected topics in the field of particle- and astrophysics with neutrons. They have a direct link with our understanding of the history of the Universe and are related to recent, ongoing or future measurements. They deal with the structure of space-time (tests of gravitation at small distance scales), search for an electric dipole moment of the neutron (CP-violation and the origin of matter in the Universe), the neutron lifetime (rate of primordial nucleosynthesis) and the two-body decay of the neutron testing the V--A structure of weak interaction (right-handed neutrinos and the very early Universe). We describe the status, measurement methods and highlight experimental challenges.